When I have an xterm Opened to full screen and run vi, I receive a message
"Terminal too wide"

Im on ...

SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-20 sun4u sparc SUNW,Ultra-60 and / or

SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-22 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-480R

Thanks for help

Regards
Chris


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end

"Chris Vidal" <cvidal@att.com> writes in comp.unix.solaris:
|When I have an xterm Opened to full screen and run vi, I receive a message
|"Terminal too wide"

Use a vi-clone (perhaps nvi or vim?) that supports more columns or make
sure your xterm is 163 columns or less wide.

-- 
________________________________________________________________________
Alan Coopersmith                              alanc@alum.calberkeley.org
http://www.CSUA.Berkeley.EDU/~alanc/       aka: Alan.Coopersmith@Sun.COM
  Working for, but definitely not speaking for, Sun Microsystems, Inc.

On Tue, 13 Jan 2004, Alan Coopersmith wrote:

> Use a vi-clone (perhaps nvi or vim?) that supports more columns or make
> sure your xterm is 163 columns or less wide.

That is an option, but I can't be the only person who wishes
that Sun would fix the bug^H^H^Hrestriction in THEIR version
of vi.

-- 
Rich Teer, SCNA, SCSA

President,
Rite Online Inc.

Voice: +1 (250) 979-1638
URL: http://www.rite-online.net

"Chris Vidal" <cvidal@att.com> writes:

>When I have an xterm Opened to full screen and run vi, I receive a message
>"Terminal too wide"

"vi" cannot handle more than 160 characters on screen.  I find this
a little annoying.  However "vim" is not so restricted.

On Tue, 13 Jan 2004 14:55:22 -0500
"Chris Vidal" <cvidal@att.com> wrote:

> When I have an xterm Opened to full screen and run vi, I receive a
> message"Terminal too wide"
> 
> Im on ...
> 
> SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-20 sun4u sparc SUNW,Ultra-60 and / or
> 
> SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-22 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-480R
> 

It's a limitation of Sun's vi. Use vim instead.


-- 
Stefaan
-- 
"What is stated clearly conceives easily."  -- Inspired sales droid

Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com> writes:

>On Tue, 13 Jan 2004, Alan Coopersmith wrote:

>> Use a vi-clone (perhaps nvi or vim?) that supports more columns or make
>> sure your xterm is 163 columns or less wide.

>That is an option, but I can't be the only person who wishes
>that Sun would fix the bug^H^H^Hrestriction in THEIR version
>of vi.

Even if the fix were to use only the first 163 columns of the screen,
that would be better than the current refusal to run.

Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 13 Jan 2004, Alan Coopersmith wrote:
> 
>> Use a vi-clone (perhaps nvi or vim?) that supports more columns or make
>> sure your xterm is 163 columns or less wide.
> 
> That is an option, but I can't be the only person who wishes
> that Sun would fix the bug^H^H^Hrestriction in THEIR version
> of vi.

Agreed. I don't want to even consider installing a 3rd party
editor on every machine I administer, just to get around this
ONE problem in Sun's vi. As a result, I gnash my teeth at it
whenever I run into it, instead.

But worse than that, the Linux nerds all laugh at me. :-(

Colin

[cbigam@somewhereelse.nucleus.com]:
>
>   Agreed. I don't want to even consider installing a 3rd party
>   editor on every machine I administer, just to get around this ONE
>   problem in Sun's vi. As a result, I gnash my teeth at it whenever
>   I run into it, instead.

ed works just fine, also in wide terminals.

-- 
Kjetil T. (is a 80x24 bigot)

In article <bu20ns$is6$2@usenet.cso.niu.edu>,
Neil W Rickert  <rickert+nn@cs.niu.edu> wrote:
>>> Use a vi-clone (perhaps nvi or vim?) that supports more columns or make
>>> sure your xterm is 163 columns or less wide.
>
>>That is an option, but I can't be the only person who wishes
>>that Sun would fix the bug^H^H^Hrestriction in THEIR version
>>of vi.
>
>Even if the fix were to use only the first 163 columns of the screen,
>that would be better than the current refusal to run.

This may cause problems in case the terminal has

{ "am",   "am",           "auto_right_margin",            "terminal has automatic margins" },

set in termcap.

So it is more than a 3 line change.

-- 
EMail:joerg@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) J�rg Schilling D-13353 Berlin
      js@cs.tu-berlin.de		(uni)  If you don't have iso-8859-1
      schilling@fokus.fraunhofer.de	(work) chars I am J"org Schilling
URL:  http://www.fokus.fraunhofer.de/usr/schilling ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily

Stefaan A Eeckels <tengo@deletemeecc.lu> wrote:
> On Tue, 13 Jan 2004 14:55:22 -0500
> "Chris Vidal" <cvidal@att.com> wrote:

>> When I have an xterm Opened to full screen and run vi, I receive a
>> message"Terminal too wide"
>>
>> Im on ...
>>
>> SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-20 sun4u sparc SUNW,Ultra-60 and / or
>>
>> SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-22 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-480R
>>

> It's a limitation of Sun's vi. Use vim instead.

That's not really good advice. Instead one should consider this matter
like a ``rite of passage'' much like the manner in which ``users'' must
become accustomed to the behaviour of ``rm -rf .''.

- SUNW doubtlessly has a good reason for this design decision and
  it is incumbent upon those us who appreciate the elegance of the
  rich Solaris environment to adapt to it model accordingly. After
  all, it's not like it's Microsloth Windoze or other inferior
  ``operating'' systems.

In short, simply modify /your/ habit of opening the terminal to full
screen. Problem solved.

In article <bu8345$vva$1@renpen.nelsonbe.com>,
	Bob Nelson <bnelson@nelsonbe.com> writes:
> Stefaan A Eeckels <tengo@deletemeecc.lu> wrote:
>> On Tue, 13 Jan 2004 14:55:22 -0500
>> "Chris Vidal" <cvidal@att.com> wrote:
>>> When I have an xterm Opened to full screen and run vi, I receive a
>>> message"Terminal too wide"
>>> Im on ...
>>> SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-20 sun4u sparc SUNW,Ultra-60 and / or
>>> SunOS  5.8 Generic_108528-22 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-480R
>> It's a limitation of Sun's vi. Use vim instead.
> That's not really good advice. Instead one should consider this matter
> like a ``rite of passage'' much like the manner in which ``users'' must
> become accustomed to the behaviour of ``rm -rf .''.
> 
> - SUNW doubtlessly has a good reason for this design decision and
>   it is incumbent upon those us who appreciate the elegance of the
>   rich Solaris environment to adapt to it model accordingly. After
>   all, it's not like it's Microsloth Windoze or other inferior
>   ``operating'' systems.
> 
> In short, simply modify /your/ habit of opening the terminal to full
> screen. Problem solved.

The only way I get 160+ lines on my 1280x1024 screen is to use a
"medium" font on an xterm. On my 20" screen thats a pretty small
font.. Use "large" instead.??. Thats still pretty small for me to read..
Thats at 75 dpi.

On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Bob Nelson wrote:

> - SUNW doubtlessly has a good reason for this design decision and

I suspect the "good design" decision was that when Bill Joy wrote
vi all those aeons ago, 132 columns was about as big as you'd
conceivably get (don't forget we're predating X and other windowing
systems by a few years!).

>   it is incumbent upon those us who appreciate the elegance of the
>   rich Solaris environment to adapt to it model accordingly. After
>   all, it's not like it's Microsloth Windoze or other inferior
>   ``operating'' systems.
>
> In short, simply modify /your/ habit of opening the terminal to full
> screen. Problem solved.

Sometimes that's the right answer, but in this case I disagree.
I can think of no technical reason why one would limit line
lengths to this degree.  Having no limit would be ideal, but
would probably require some internal rejiggery that probably
isn't worth the effort.  But increasing the limit to (say)
1024 or 2048 characters would be a good compromise.

FWIW, I run my displays at 1600 x 1280.  At the font size I
prefer, a dtterm can be as wide as 222 columns.  I do, however,
usually keep them to 132 columns.  But it ouwld be nice to
be able to use a wider window should the need arise, using the vi
that comes with Solaris.

-- 
Rich Teer, SCNA, SCSA

President,
Rite Online Inc.

Voice: +1 (250) 979-1638
URL: http://www.rite-online.net

Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com> writes:

> On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Bob Nelson wrote:
> 
> > - SUNW doubtlessly has a good reason for this design decision and
> 
> I suspect the "good design" decision was that when Bill Joy wrote vi
> all those aeons ago, 132 columns was about as big as you'd
> conceivably get (don't forget we're predating X and other windowing
> systems by a few years!).
> 
> >   it is incumbent upon those us who appreciate the elegance of the
> >   rich Solaris environment to adapt to it model accordingly. After
> >   all, it's not like it's Microsloth Windoze or other inferior
> >   ``operating'' systems.
> >
> > In short, simply modify /your/ habit of opening the terminal to
> > full screen. Problem solved.
> 
> Sometimes that's the right answer, but in this case I disagree.  I
> can think of no technical reason why one would limit line lengths to
> this degree.  Having no limit would be ideal, but would probably
> require some internal rejiggery that probably isn't worth the
> effort.  But increasing the limit to (say) 1024 or 2048 characters
> would be a good compromise.

I frequently have to look at log files which contain very long
lines. It's hard to read the lines when they wrap around, and
I prefer to widen the window as much as I can to keep that from
happening. 

The AIX version of vi, for one, has never restricted me in this. Nor
does vim (on linux at least, we can't install it on Solaris because of
admin concerns).

What really gets up my nose is that the command line also goes crazy
when you expand the terminal window too much. I lose command line
editing capability at some point. Annoying.

Joe

At Fri, 16 Jan 2004 07:30:19 GMT, Bob Nelson <bnelson@nelsonbe.com> writes:

> - SUNW doubtlessly has a good reason for this design decision

Yup, now that Bill Joy's gone, there's nobody left who's willing to
look at the "vi" source code (much less fix it :-).

All joking aside, it's Sun bug 1170460, dating back many years.  It's
been reported many times, and there are at least two duplicates in the
database.  Bug 4762882 gives a little more detail about why the limit
is there: has to do with supporting two lines of open on 24x80
terminals where 'vi' switches to pseudohardcopy mode when a line gets
longer than 80 characters.  (You don't want to know what
pseudohardcopy mode is.  :-)

Other UNIX vendors increased the limit long ago.  HP bumped it around
1990, I think.  It shouldn't be that hard, though there may be some
issues in dealing with old expreserve files (I don't know the
internals).

I suspect more people are reporting the bug to Sun these days since
they are coming from GNU/Linux, where "vi" implementations do not have
this unwarranted limitation.

joe@invalid.address wrote:

> Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com> writes:
> 


<quote From Rich Teer snipped>


<intro to post snipped>
> 
> The AIX version of vi, for one, has never restricted me in this. Nor
> does vim (on linux at least, we can't install it on Solaris because of
> admin concerns).
> 

What are the admin concerns about vim on solaris? Are they with the app
itself? with supporting too many apps? Or something else? I believe that
SUN has an SFW package for vim -  yes?

At Fri, 16 Jan 2004 23:41:56 -0500, Moss Hart <act1@operamail.com> writes:

> What are the admin concerns about vim on solaris?

It's optionally installed so you can't rely on it being there.
vi is always there.

In article <7wk73rc5ni.fsf@sic.twinsun.com>,
Paul Eggert  <eggert@twinsun.com> wrote:
>At Fri, 16 Jan 2004 23:41:56 -0500, Moss Hart <act1@operamail.com> writes:
>
>> What are the admin concerns about vim on solaris?
>
>It's optionally installed so you can't rely on it being there.
>vi is always there.

Well, this is not really an argument.

I use vi only in rare cases as a few minutes after I log into
a machine that I plan to use longer than a few minutes, I install my
ved and use this editor.

-- 
EMail:joerg@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) J�rg Schilling D-13353 Berlin
      js@cs.tu-berlin.de		(uni)  If you don't have iso-8859-1
      schilling@fokus.fraunhofer.de	(work) chars I am J"org Schilling
URL:  http://www.fokus.fraunhofer.de/usr/schilling ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily

js@cs.tu-berlin.de (Joerg Schilling) writes:
>In article <7wk73rc5ni.fsf@sic.twinsun.com>,
>Paul Eggert  <eggert@twinsun.com> wrote:
>>At Fri, 16 Jan 2004 23:41:56 -0500, Moss Hart <act1@operamail.com> writes:
>>
>>> What are the admin concerns about vim on solaris?
>>
>>It's optionally installed so you can't rely on it being there.
>>vi is always there.
>
>Well, this is not really an argument.
>
>I use vi only in rare cases as a few minutes after I log into
>a machine that I plan to use longer than a few minutes, I install my
>ved and use this editor.

As do we all, but ocassionally it's 2AM, someone's screaming at you
to get it working *NOW*, you left the CD with your favourite tools
on it back at the hotel, the box isn't network connected and you
have to edit a file.

-- 
       "The road to Paradise is through Intercourse."
        [email me at huge [at] huge [dot] org [dot] uk]

Moss Hart <act1@operamail.com> wrote:

> What are the admin concerns about vim on solaris? Are they with the app
> itself? with supporting too many apps? Or something else? I believe that
> SUN has an SFW package for vim -  yes?

Hmm. Well here are a few thoughts.

Installing a package on dozens of servers (and potentially hundreds of
workstations) just to get around this ONE flaw in Sun vi is fairly
silly and counterproductive. For those of us who support several companies,
it's simply impossible. Besides, this isn't about an extra feature in
vim, it's about a flaw in Sun's implementation of vi. HP, IBM, and SGI
all have it working just fine.

Installing vim doesn't fix anything--it just kludges around the problem.
Sun really should just change the hard limit in the binary, and release
a patch for us to all dance around over. :-)

Colin

<cbigam@somewhereelse.nucleus.com> wrote in message
news:4004b3a2@news.nucleus.com...
> Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com> wrote:
> > On Tue, 13 Jan 2004, Alan Coopersmith wrote:
> >
> >> Use a vi-clone (perhaps nvi or vim?) that supports more columns or make
> >> sure your xterm is 163 columns or less wide.
> >
> > That is an option, but I can't be the only person who wishes
> > that Sun would fix the bug^H^H^Hrestriction in THEIR version
> > of vi.
>
> Agreed. I don't want to even consider installing a 3rd party
> editor on every machine I administer, just to get around this
> ONE problem in Sun's vi. As a result, I gnash my teeth at it
> whenever I run into it, instead.

Have you thought about installing the vi clone on one of the machines and
sharing the app via NFS, then creating a new auto_apps map and automounting
as and when required?

>
> But worse than that, the Linux nerds all laugh at me. :-(
>
> Colin

Regards
Tom

In article <400bad54@news.star.co.uk>,
Thomas Shaw <info@dellylix.plus.com> did thusly spew forth: 
><cbigam@somewhereelse.nucleus.com> wrote in message
>news:4004b3a2@news.nucleus.com...
>> Agreed. I don't want to even consider installing a 3rd party
>> editor on every machine I administer, just to get around this
>> ONE problem in Sun's vi. As a result, I gnash my teeth at it
>> whenever I run into it, instead.
>
>Have you thought about installing the vi clone on one of the machines and
>sharing the app via NFS, then creating a new auto_apps map and automounting
>as and when required?

Err... Yeah. That's so much better of a solution, particularly in shops
that don't run NFS at all.

-tom